]]>http://criticallysane.com/the-perfectly-sane-show-ep-262-killer-filler/feed/0Jeff, Fozzy, and Chris discuss the gaming lull and some other stuff. - Music in this episode Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA - Follow us on Twitter. - Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer Tony – iamnapoleon1066 Don - TheSobaer Jeff, Fozzy, and Chris discuss the gaming lull and some other stuff.
Music in this episode
Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA
Follow us on Twitter.
Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer
Tony – iamnapoleon1066
Don - TheSobaer
Jeff – JustSomeDude899
Chris – kariyanine
Subscribe and review us on iTunesCritically Saneno1:16:17Come With Me if You Want Good Terminator Gameshttp://criticallysane.com/come-with-me-if-you-want-good-terminator-games/
http://criticallysane.com/come-with-me-if-you-want-good-terminator-games/#commentsFri, 31 Jul 2015 13:30:28 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5370There might only be two good Terminator films, but there are zero good Terminator games. No one has ever made a good Terminator game. Not one. Robocop Vs Terminator on the Sega Mega Drive was a cracker, but that was just as much, if not more of, a Robocop game. So it doesn’t count. If we keep relying on film tie games we’ll never bring one of film’s most enduring villains to an imitation of life on consoles. Do not despair though. There is a chance. I have traveled from the dark future of 2023, where Terminator: Genisys – Nuclear Dawn – Robot Vacation 3 is premiering, to tell you how to avert disaster. I can also assure you that I am quite naked, but that’s more of a personal choice rather than any limitations in time travel technology.

The solution I propose is a simple one. After a cursory Google search it is clear that I am not alone in strolling down this particular line of thought. We need to Alien: Isolation the Terminator. Much like their games, the Alien and Terminator films follow a very similar evolution. Both franchises started off firmly rooted in the horror genre. 1984’s The Terminator and 1979’s Alien both feature hidden, unknowable, and relentless stalkers that deal in violence and death. They exude an ever-present menace that gets under the skin. Then comes Terminator 2: Judgement Day and Aliens, which bring the action, explosions and classic one liners.

We like shooting guns so it is unsurprising that games have mostly drawn from the second films in each respective franchise. Yet just like the xenomorphs, Terminators have been victims of diminishing returns ever since. Something Skynet is quite powerless against. They’re just not that scary anymore. They’re no longer a threat. They’re just not fun to be with.

The problem with The Terminator action game is from the very start, developers must neuter the enemy to facilitate the experience they are selling to players. “Yes,” they’ll say sitting around the boardroom table, “the Terminator is an unstoppable killing machines but players expect to shoot hundreds, if not thousands of them over the course of our campaign. So they’re going to have to be your bog standard cannon fodder, but shinier. With Austrian accents.” Then Ed-209 bursts into the room and machine guns one of them for an inordinate amount of time.

Wait, wrong franchise. Sorry.

Terminator needs to go back to basics. We need to recapture the thrill of the chase. Knowing a remorseless killing machine, that cannot be reasoned with, is on your tail. That you simply cannot stop it because there’s not a steel mill in sight. It will not stop until it shoots you in the head, and then shoots you five more times for good measure.

The Terminator would make a great stealth/chase game. Set it in a city, this way there’s plenty of places to hide, car chases to be had and any violence the player commits is just as likely to draw the attention of local law enforcement as well as the Terminator. Have it so the identity of the Terminator remains hidden to ramp up the tensions and paranoia. This is essentially what the game based on The Thing tried to do back in 2002. The Thing’s video game adaptation was ahead of its time, but ultimately failed because the technology just wasn’t there yet. It’s here now though, and we shouldn’t let it go to waste.

A successful Terminator game would need to strip the T-800 back down to its metal endoskeleton and instill a bit of life into those metal bones. We need to embrace our vulnerability and fear the future. I wouldn’t say no to someone having another crack at The Thing either.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/come-with-me-if-you-want-good-terminator-games/feed/0The Perfectly Sane Show Ep. 261: Fozzy is Yellowhttp://criticallysane.com/the-perfectly-sane-show-ep-261-fozzy-is-yellow/
http://criticallysane.com/the-perfectly-sane-show-ep-261-fozzy-is-yellow/#commentsFri, 24 Jul 2015 21:30:47 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5366Tony, Jeff, and Earl sit down to talk about the lack of stuff to talk about.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/the-perfectly-sane-show-ep-260goodbye-iwata/feed/0The guys talk golf and Batman before covering the sudden passing of Nintendo head Satoru Iwata. - Music in this episode Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA - Follow us on Twitter. - Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer The guys talk golf and Batman before covering the sudden passing of Nintendo head Satoru Iwata.
Music in this episode
Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA
Follow us on Twitter.
Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer
Tony – iamnapoleon1066
Don - TheSobaer
Jeff – JustSomeDude899
Chris – kariyanine
Subscribe and review us on iTunesCritically Saneno1:24:59Batman: Arkham Knight Reviewhttp://criticallysane.com/batman-arkham-knight-review/
http://criticallysane.com/batman-arkham-knight-review/#commentsThu, 16 Jul 2015 14:46:15 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5353Batman: Arkham Knight is one of the more maddening efforts I have played in recent memory. The core gameplay is better than it ever was, with both predator and combat sequences built dynamically into the world, naturally flowing together with the game’s open nature. If the game focused on these elements, the actual “Batmaning,” if you will, we might be talking game of the year candidate. Yet, bizarrely, the game is centered around not Batman, but his ride, and puts its worst elements at the forefront far too often.

Arkham Knight opens with the villain Scarecrow threatening Gotham City with certain destruction. The city is evacuated, leaving Batman to confront Scarecrow and his allies without any civilians present anywhere. It’s a convenient premise, and one that allows a similar “beat the crap out of anyone you encounter because they are evil” environment that we had in both Arkham Asylum and Arkham City. It was also the first of numerous qualms I had with the game’s storyline. Batman consistently takes absurd risks to rescue the people of Gotham, people who aren’t there right now. The city’s evacuation removes the sense of urgency from the situation, and I am left to wonder why I absolutely have to dive into yet another impossible situation RIGHT NOW. Who am I saving?

The storyline, a strength of the previous games, is muddled and lacks punch. Scarecrow, a villain who strikes at the fear within us all, isn’t scary. He serves more as an annoying, mocking narrator, who repeatedly fails to meet that standard that every rudimentary editor knows: show me, don’t tell me. The plot’s treatment of the awesome female characters of the Batman universe lies somewhere between cliched, woman in the refrigerator crap and overt misogyny. And while I found the device the game used to convey Batman’s battle for his sanity to be compelling at first, it gets overused, like a great pop song played too many times on the radio, and then played some more.

The free flow combat of the previous games returns here, and it is fun as ever. There’s still nothing quite like dropping into a group of 20 thugs and beating the crap out of them. Arkham Knight adds a few new wrinkles. Some of the fights are in tandem with other superheroes, allowing for tandem takedowns and character switching. Some of the Riddler fights use this switching to add a puzzle aspect to the combat that is really interesting. The game also adds some cool environmental takedowns, and, when in presence of the Batmobile, it too can be used to add some spice to the old art of fist-to-face.

The game’s predator sequences are built right into the world. That is, the majority of them don’t have Batman trapped in an enclosed space, but allow him to escape out into Gotham and return from a new angle. This, to me, makes a lot more sense, and allows for more creativity as you take down the group of armed foes. Some additional gadgets, including one which disables your opponent’s’ weapons without their notice, allow for some new opportunities. There are also now fear takedowns, which allow Batman to ambush a group of armed foes, taking them each out in one button press, using the fear caused by his sudden appearance. It’s a nice change.

Batman, now out in his largest world ever, needs to travel in style. Arkham Knight features the Batmobile, a decision, which both for good and ill (mostly, in my opinion, ill) affects every other aspect of the game. The Batmobile is a cross between a race car and a tank, tearing through the city streets, rolling over or going through any obstacle in its way. When the game uses the Batmobile well, in chase sequences and in puzzle solving, it’s quite entertaining and fun to use. However, too often the game uses the Batmobile in tank battle sequences, which come to dominate much of the campaign and a large number of the side quests. The tank battles aren’t fun, and the game’s idea of “variety” in the numerous instances you are forced to fight in them is to include increasing numbers of foes. The Batmobile is also responsible for some of the worst boss battles in recent memory, including one particular underground sequence where the tank-like controls of the vehicle are suddenly expected to allow deft maneuvering in a closed space. For every step forward the Batmobile adds to the franchise, it takes two annoying, slap-in-the-face level steps back.

Batman isn’t confined to the Batmobile, and can fly across the city using his Batclaw and cape. As he wanders, he can hunt down side quests, which vary from exciting (stopping Two Face from robbing a bank, or destroying the Penguin’s weapon caches with Nightwing) to intriguing (the Riddler always makes things interesting, and knocks you off your ego perch) to monotonous (fight tanks in a close radius… again, or track down the 250 Riddler trophies). Some of the side missions (especially the Riddler ones) were more interesting than the missions in the main campaign, and many of them include appearances from villains across the Batman universe. There are a lot of them, however, and this is where one of the game’s most bizarre design decisions lies. The true ending of the game is locking behind completely 100% of everything. This includes tracking down all the RIddler trophies. I’m not really sure why anyone thought this was a good idea, so I did the side missions I enjoyed, completed the campaign, and watched the ending on YouTube. It was very nice.

I love the parts of Arkham Knight that allow me to be Batman, to be invincible in hand-to-hand combat, and fearsome to my confused and terrified enemies. But too often, Arkham Knight emphasizes its other aspects, and between the oddly-prevalent tank combat, the weak storyline, and some other odd decisions (like hiding the game’s true ending behind 100% completion), I’m left wondering what might have been. As the game opens, it tells you this is how the Batman dies. I seriously hope that is not the case.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/batman-arkham-knight-review/feed/0Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour Reviewhttp://criticallysane.com/rory-mcilroys-pga-tour-review/
http://criticallysane.com/rory-mcilroys-pga-tour-review/#commentsTue, 14 Jul 2015 04:01:06 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5342Last year’s lack of of a PGA Tour game from EA Sports left a hole in my gaming agenda. A temporary fix was given by The Golf Club, but it lacked what I loved most about the Tiger Woods games: a lengthy career to build up a golfer from scratch. Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour is the return of the yearly EA Sports title I always anticipated most, and at first the game brought a smile to my face. But the more I played it, the more the cracks in the foundation started to show.

Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour is the best looking golf game on the market, hands down. There were a few graphical hiccups I noticed, like disappearing ducks for example, but in general, the Frostbite 3 engine makes this game look absolutely beautiful. Pretty much every time the camera panned around the course, my breath was taken aback. From the trees to the grass, the visuals are simply stunning.

The game starts off with a short introduction by McIlroy and some playable sections acting as a tutorial and game setup. The famed golfer talks about his feelings while he plays, I got to fiddle around with control schemes, and generally had an opportunity to relearn the game. While there’s a claim that this PGA Tour game started from scratch, it still very much feels like the Tiger Woods games from yesteryear. I could curve shots, hit them low or lop them high into the air with an arc. Most importantly, they brought back my favorite 3-click system.

The last few Tiger Woods games slightly suffered by the “realistic” stick swing, where I had to pull back on the analog stick and push up to swing. I had missed the old 3-click system, which has me pressing a button to start the swing, again to stop it in the ideal power marker (or before or after depending on the distance I wanted), and then finally one more time to stop it in the accuracy marker. I instantly fell back in love with the 3-click system, and when trying the analog system after that, I realized how much I disliked the analog stick swing.

Great visuals, check. Bring back the 3-click system, check. EA Tiburon was on a role. The next great thing was, of course, the career mode. This is why I play sports games, to take control of a person, and evolve them with experience. Unfortunately, the career mode in Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour is rather shallow. The silver lining is the new “quick play” feature. Instead of having to play 4 rounds of 18 holes on the same course back to back for one tournament, the game pre-selects 4-8 holes per day, and simulates the rest based on your stats. The first three days were random holes, but the last day was always the last 8 holes so I had control over my score in the end. This new mechanic is a very welcome one. I could play several tournaments a night, as opposed to before, when I would play one and stop.

The shallowness was not evident at first, though, I should have seen the writing on the wall when I went to create my character. The character creation is one of the thinnest I have experienced in years. There were a dozen heads to chose, half a dozen hair styles, no facial hair options. In short, I could not create “me,” complete with awesome beard and fantastic hair, and play as “me,” despite my golfer’s name being my own name. At this point, I might as well have played with a pro golfer.

After sinking several hours into the career, it finally started to lose its shimmer. Leveling up was raising my stats, but I could not pick what was getting better. I could have put everything into putting, but instead random things were getting leveled up. Playing well in a tournament would get me more experience, and leveling up would unlock new equipment, none of which I had to buy, as there is no sort of currency. So all-in-all, despite the amazing presentation that EA Sports provides, the career had no hook after a good length of time.

There are no online clubs this year around. The online play in general is rather lacking. There are daily and weekly tournaments, but if you play like me with the ball arc and such, you won’t get very far as it was turned off on the two I tried. There’s also no real hook here, no sort of progression. The online clubs from the past game were a great touch and sorely missed this year.

What is a great deal of fun, and probably the most fun in the whole package, are the Night Club Challenges. These are little mini-games, like try to arc the ball through a ring in the air, with a bonus ring further in the distance only reached by a boost and good timing. Or landing a ball in a specific spot and making it stop without rolling off to oblivion. This mode was a lot of fun. I could take my golfer in, but I wish I could have leveled him up while playing through them.

Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour is a return to form in some areas, showing that EA Sports has the best looking golf games with the best interface and controls. But the game feels like PGA Tour Lite. Only a handful of courses, less than a handful of golfers, a weak golfer creator, a thin career mode, and even weaker online functionality, PGA Tour plays like a AAA title, but more like a beta with half the features available. Sure, more courses and golfers are coming, and for free, but the most painful missing links are something I don’t think they can just cover up with DLC.

This review was written with review material provided by the publisher on the Xbox One home console. For more information on our review policies, please read here.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/the-perfectly-sane-show-ep-259-don-cant-talk-about-golf/feed/0Chris plays Batman, Don and Tony hate it. Also Don has played golf but can't talk about it. - Music in this episode Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA - Follow us on Twitter. - Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer Tony – iamnapoleon1066 Chris plays Batman, Don and Tony hate it. Also Don has played golf but can't talk about it.
Music in this episode
Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA
Follow us on Twitter.
Fozzy - FozzyTheGamer
Tony – iamnapoleon1066
Don - TheSobaer
Jeff – JustSomeDude899
Chris – kariyanine
Subscribe and review us on iTunesCritically Saneno1:27:13Three for Thursday: Evolving Puzzle and Dragons: Super Mario Bros. Editionhttp://criticallysane.com/three-for-thursday-evolving-puzzle-and-dragons-super-mario-bros-edition/
http://criticallysane.com/three-for-thursday-evolving-puzzle-and-dragons-super-mario-bros-edition/#commentsThu, 09 Jul 2015 11:47:28 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5337A few years ago, I had a serious case of Puzzle and Dragons fever, which was the first mobile game to ever really keep me playing for more than a week. Eventually I moved on to other games, the next in line being the awfully addicting Marvel Puzzle Quest. But I still had a little place in the corner of my heart that missed my first mobile love affair. I’m sure you can imagine how ecstatic I was to see Nintendo embrace this series and release a Mario skinned version. Puzzle and Dragons Mario Edition was a fun game, sure. It had all of the charm from both Puzzle and Dragons and Super Mario Bros., and was pretty addicting for the first several hours.

Something happened though, as I hit the end of World 3. Besides the brick wall and hours of having to level up different characters to clear the last boss, I was beginning to see little nuances that bugged me and already wishing for a sequel. Nintendo has a few things they could add to the formula they already laid the foundation for or could go an entirely new direction. Either way is completely fine with me.

Add a Rarity rating to characters

Those familiar with Puzzle and Dragons on iOS and Android are familiar with the star ratings. You start with low star characters, and eventually build a team of high star, super rare characters. In the Super Mario Bros. Edition, there does not appear to be a rating system. So while that new Mario you unlocked is stronger than the last (with different types though, so you can’t just ditch the previous one all together), there is no rating system to tell you this. That’s a poor example, but when you start getting a variety of enemies to join your team, picking one becomes increasingly difficult as time passes. Knowing that a Paragoomba is a three star character and a Dry Bones is a four star character would make setting up teams far easier.

Have special events with cross-franchise characters

There is an amazing opportunity here because of Nintendo’s beloved character roster. Most of these CCG (collectible card game) or Match-3 type games have daily, weekly, or monthly events where they offer special rewards. Since this is not a free-to-play, I realize it is a little different, but some of those game mechanics could still carry over with some tweaking. A special week long Zelda event that offers drops from the Zelda franchise (and Link/Zelda being a reward for clearing the series of stages) would do wonders for the game. Nintendo has such a variety of franchises, they could run weekly events like this with each of them which would mix things up.

Go Free-to-Play all together

This is actually the direction I would prefer, though adding the former two would be great. Going free-to-play opens the game up to a possible cash influx due to people trying it out and falling in love. Sure there was a demo to Puzzle and Dragons: Super Mario Edition, but modeling the next game more-so after Puzzle and Dragons itself would be a major game changer. Pokemon should not be the only big franchise to get a free-to-play game (or games, in this instance), and Puzzle and Dragon: Mario Edition F2P would have potential to be a big hit.

While Puzzle and Dragons: Super Mario Bros. Edition fell a little flat due to high expectations, it was a fun game and if I had more time I would sink some more time into it. Not having character ratings was my most frustrating part of the game, and was what eventually made me stop playing. As far as Puzzle and Dragons Z is concerned, I only played an hour or so and never intend to play that or any evolution of that game again, as it felt like a cheapened version of Pokemon, with bad graphics and all. I do hope Nintendo tries to enhance Super Mario Bros. Edition, though, as it did have potential.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/three-for-thursday-evolving-puzzle-and-dragons-super-mario-bros-edition/feed/22015 Video Game Power Rankings: Julyhttp://criticallysane.com/2015-video-game-power-rankings-july/
http://criticallysane.com/2015-video-game-power-rankings-july/#commentsWed, 08 Jul 2015 13:30:45 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5332Welcome to the Critically Sane monthly Power Rankings for July 2015. As always the list is based on a mix of our opinions of what we’ve played this year as well as conjecture on what we think is going to be awesome in the months to come. The five of us each submit a list of 10 titles which are given a point total in reverse order (so 1st place gets 10 points, while 10th gets one), and then the totals are combined to come up with this monthly list. The same games ruled the top of our list for six months but a new victor has emerged as the clear #1. (Last month’s rankings)

10t. Tony Hawk: Pro Skater 5 (8 points, no change) – Jeff is still pretty hyped for this game but he seems to be the only one of us.

10t. Total War: Attila (8 points, -1 position change) – If anything gets Tony excited its a new Total War game.

8t. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (9 points, +1 position change) – This may be Kojima’s last Metal Gear Song, if it is we’re hoping it goes out in a blaze of glory from Ocelot’s revolvers.

8t. Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Siege (9 points, -2 position change) – Each of us has a favorite that no one else really cares about. This is Don’s.

7. Batman: Arkham Knight (10 points, -3 position change) – Opinion seems to be mixed on this one but it seems it won’t have the staying power we had thought it would.

6. Rock Band 4 (13 points, -1 position change, 1 first place vote) – We’re getting the band back together and it’s going to be a drunkenly glorious time.

5. Star Wars: Battlefront (15 points, returning) – It faded from our consciousness before E3 but that demo brought it all back and the guys can’t wait to get on the field and shoot some stormtroopers.

4. Halo 5: Guardians (22 points, -1 position change) – The E3 demo was strong. So strong it even has Don thinking he’ll give this Halo a try.

3. Rise of the Tomb Raider (32 points, -2 position change, 1 first place vote) – After six months of ruling the top Lara latest adventure slipped a bit but we’re still super excited to play it.

2. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (33 points, no change, 1 first place vote) – While Geralt was unable to climb to the top this month, we think he’ll be a strong contender down the line this year.

1. Fallout 4 (44 points, new, 2 first place votes) – Bethesda had a monster E3, but it was all on the back of Fallout 4. The hype is real but can it live up to it is the real question.

If you had to predict your top 10 list at the end of 2015, what would it look like? Let us know in the comments below.

]]>http://criticallysane.com/2015-video-game-power-rankings-july/feed/2Payday 2: Crimewave Edition Reviewhttp://criticallysane.com/payday-2-crimewave-edition-review/
http://criticallysane.com/payday-2-crimewave-edition-review/#commentsTue, 07 Jul 2015 15:42:18 +0000http://criticallysane.com/?p=5321Everything was going just as we had planned. There were four of us hitting the bank, and while certainly not our first rodeo, this was the first time we were hitting one quietly. Normally, we stroll in guns blazing. But this time we wanted to clean the whole thing out. Three of the four guards were down, the last one circling back so Rags (note: all names have been changed to protect the identity of my fellow heisters) could take him down. In one smooth motion, the guard was silently put down and his radio answered to keep everyone off our tracks. All we had left was to clear two sections of the bank for civilians, most importantly the bank tellers as they could sound the alarm. Twenty minutes into this heist, and everything was perfect. We screamed at everyone to get down, and moved all the hostages to the bank teller room. Monkey set the drill up at the vault while I stared at the hostages all laying on the floor. I smiled, thinking about the massive payday we were about to have, then watched in horror as Rags accidently dropped a grenade he had been playing with in the middle of the hostages. So much for our silent heist.

That was a true story from one of my many outings in Payday 2: Crimewave Edition. Don’t worry: we still made it out with a lot of cash. But a big portion of fun in Payday 2 is trying to do the job stealthily.

Payday 2: Crimewave Edition is yet another fancy remastered game from the previous console generation. Only, instead of just making it look prettier, it packs in all of the content from the PC version. If you are at all familiar with the PC version of Payday 2, you’ll know it was heavily supported after it’s release, while the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions only saw a few updates and DLC packs combined. For fan of the first game, this is great news because there is a vast array of new things to do. If you missed the last game because of timing, this year is perfect too, being as it launches in summer time and not right before the fall storm.

To briefly bring everyone up to speed (for more in-depth on the original game, read my review of it here), Payday 2 is about robbing banks, stealing drugs, holding up jewelry stores, and the like. There are certain other events, like rigging an election, that can be played, but I know my personal favorite ones are the aforementioned banks and jewelry stores. A good portion of the jobs can be done stealthily, which grant a significant bonus to not just the job you are playing, but yield an extra bonus of XP in the next job you play.

A driving force in keeping me playing were the paydays at the end, where you select one of three cards, which give you a random item. Usually it’s nonsense, like a modification for a weapon you don’t use, or a small sum of cash (I find it insulting to be given $20,000 in one of these instances when I just finished a job that payed me over a million in spending cash). But then there are the times they give you a new mask, which makes up for the last dozen or so times you got garbage. Random loot is something people either love or hate, and I certainly love it.

Money is then split between spending cash and the other 70% or so is diverted into an offshore bank account. My last time playing on PS3, I don’t recall there being a reason to have an offshore bank account. One of the updates provided in Crimewave Edition allows you to spend that money on a few things, most notably the lottery where you can pay a minimal fee for a payday, then start ticking off selections for more money. So if you really want an Infamous-rated mask (super rare), you select Mask, infamous, and then can pay an absurd amount to lock all three cards as masks assuming you are at high enough of a level, which then pays out a guaranteed mask with a small chance of being Infamous.

Another great addition was allowing the player to have multiple skill sets. Skills are by far the most important part of the game, and who you play with may change your position on the team. I primarily rolled as a Technician, which had super quiet drills, C4 charges to blow doors and safes, and drills that not only had a chance to auto-restart, but were also faster. But once my crew started playing at harder difficulty settings, it became necessary to create a juggernaut-like class with super strong armor and overpowered shotguns. So now, while setting up for a job, I could instantly swap between classes to make sure I could maximize my role on the team.

Various jobs, a few characters, several weapons, and a slew of masks have been added. Also, an Infamy option had been added. I’m pretty sure this is Overkill’s version of Prestiging from another popular shooter, so once you hit level 100, you get a few perks and dump a large sum of offshore money and get to start over at level 1.

There is one problem keeping this from being the standout game it could be. Crimenet, the way you find jobs online, is partially broken. I, personally, have never been able to join a game (note: A patch was released between the writing and posting of this article, which increased the success rate of connecting, though it was still having problems after mild testing). But, if I start an online game and just play until people show up, I have had success in meeting fellow heisters that way. Also, joining friends works with no problem at all, so I could join my friends’ games without a hitch.

Payday 2: Crimewave Edition is even more of the great game that launched back on old consoles, with a minor hiccup. In a day and age where shooters generally fall into one of two categories, fast-paced action or slow and tactical, Payday 2 sits off to the side with it’s own unique take on the genre. Playing alone is fine and fun, but when you get together with three other people and really start coordinating your job, it’s a blast.

This review was written with review code provided by the publisher on the Xbox One console. For more information on our review policies, please read here.